Who's Ash
Musician/producer with over 500 million streams of his own compositions; the ability to play piano, guitar, sax, drums/pads, electronic keyboards/wind instrument; a life shared between Egypt and French Canada.
The Cairo-born, Montreal-based producer plays his own work live. But it’s the streaming platforms which have enabled him to reach so many millions. Ash’s big break after an encouraging response to ‘Lost’ (2012) came with the monster hit ‘Mosaique’, at first an under the radar experiment with a middle eastern vibe, suddenly on 500k streams a day, 3 months later 40 million, and to date, 100 million, in the top 50 in many countries. Not only a grower, but a stayer – first released in 2016, the streams have been a torrent, boosted by ‘that’ 2019 pyramids video which has almost 4 million YouTube views. Ash has released many more tracks of which ‘Worlds Apart’, ‘Give a Little’, ‘Daydream’, ‘Dans La Peau’, and most recently, ‘Senses’, have all scored between 2-5 million streams on Spotify alone. The world, and perhaps the Sphinx, eagerly await his first album.
Ash had been producing his own work since age 13, having studied piano since
emulating his big bro aged 6, and learned his impressive range of other instruments
from scratch simply as a way to feature them on his early tracks. A possible
alternative career was in politics, as he became a student intern in Canadian Prime
Minister Justin Trudeau’s office, until the joy of making music and Mosaique’s
success decided his choice of career.
As a child in Cairo, Ash heard French and Egyptian classics, notably pianist Omar
Khairat, until at 12 he discovered electronic music and began to DJ and produce,
captivated by the melodic trance of Van Buuren and Van Dyk. At 16, a schoolmate
introduced him to Electronica, Deep House and the like via Wankelmut, Nicolas Jaar
and Animal Trainer.
The Cairo-born, Montreal-based producer plays his own work live. But it’s the streaming platforms which have enabled him to reach so many millions. Ash’s big break after an encouraging response to ‘Lost’ (2012) came with the monster hit ‘Mosaique’, at first an under the radar experiment with a middle eastern vibe, suddenly on 500k streams a day, 3 months later 40 million, and to date, 100 million, in the top 50 in many countries. Not only a grower, but a stayer – first released in 2016, the streams have been a torrent, boosted by ‘that’ 2019 pyramids video which has almost 4 million YouTube views. Ash has released many more tracks of which ‘Worlds Apart’, ‘Give a Little’, ‘Daydream’, ‘Dans La Peau’, and most recently, ‘Senses’, have all scored between 2-5 million streams on Spotify alone. The world, and perhaps the Sphinx, eagerly await his first album.
Ash had been producing his own work since age 13, having studied piano since
emulating his big bro aged 6, and learned his impressive range of other instruments
from scratch simply as a way to feature them on his early tracks. A possible
alternative career was in politics, as he became a student intern in Canadian Prime
Minister Justin Trudeau’s office, until the joy of making music and Mosaique’s
success decided his choice of career.
As a child in Cairo, Ash heard French and Egyptian classics, notably pianist Omar
Khairat, until at 12 he discovered electronic music and began to DJ and produce,
captivated by the melodic trance of Van Buuren and Van Dyk. At 16, a schoolmate
introduced him to Electronica, Deep House and the like via Wankelmut, Nicolas Jaar
and Animal Trainer.
